Maria Sue Butler, MFT FL Approved supervisor
Marriage & Family Therapist
Hollywood, FL 33024
Couples Skill Building
When the Skills Are Applied the Marriage Will Thrive
Action Relational Therapy Offers Effective Therapy Centered in Relationships and Skill Building. Why couples therapy?
Aiming to regain what brought you together:
Silent tense car rides replace the lively conversations and laughter of years before. Being in the company of the person you love seems more painful than being alone. What happened? There could be many reasons why couples experience difficulties and misunderstandings that set them apart and weaken the once very close relationship. Couples therapy at ART has been successful because it focuses on partners regaining what brought them together.
For Couples Who Have Children:
When children experience problems such as substance abuse, ADHD, uncontrollable negative expressions of anger, depression, oppositional behavior, anxiety or any other life difficulty, the relationship between the parents is often affected, and the couple find themselves fighting to help and save their child, and also to maintain their own relationship. Sometimes, it is the wife who feels that she does not get enough emotional support and is parenting the troubled child alone. Her criticism of how her husband is handling the situation affects him deeply and the interactions between them are very negative, and both blame each other for what they are experiencing as parents and as a couple.
A Cycle that Repeats Itself:
Their troubled relationship is obvious to everyone in the family, and the child facing the difficulties may experience a sense of guilt, hopelessness, and isolation. Not knowing where to turn, or what to do, the child's symptoms become more recurrent and serious, as this happens, the parents become fearful and frustrated, and most of the time, their arguments increase and intensify. In response, the child reaches a crisis.
Healing Starts with you, the Couple:
Couples therapy along with family therapy will not only restore peaceful, clear communication between husband and wife, but will also greatly increase the chances for their child to regain mental and emotional health. It is not important to find out what came first, the couple's relationship difficulties or their child's symptoms. The most important goal is to achieve a general sense of well being among all members of the family. This is possible by developing skills that will greatly improve the couple's communication, and conflict resolutions styles.
For Couples without Children:
Gaining back trust, consideration, appreciation and care from the one you love becomes an important goal for couples who find themselves in a relationship crisis. It is not only important to talk about "the issues", but to develop skills that will help couples to establish calm communication without arguing and placing blame on each other. This effectively decreases the crisis couples usually face by the time they seek therapy. At ART of Florida, we facilitate skills development, which means that each spouse learns to identify and apply necessary skills.